(upbeat music)

You know, you can have a great mission, but the mission is only as good as the people, right? The mission for your organization is only as good as the people in your organization. CSforALL has tremendous people, and one of the best people is the speaker I'm gonna introduce to you right now. His name is Mr. Bernell Murray. So please welcome him up to the stage.

(Jason clapping)
(audience applauding)

Thank you. Good morning everyone. I'll try again, good morning everyone. Good morning. Let's do it. I need that energy today, my man. Appreciate you. Before I get started, let me set this up. Thank you my friend. If you can see, there's instructions. I'm an educator, this is my 11th year. I still consider myself an educator. And so as you all know, being educators yourself, it's important to engage with your audience, whomever they are. And I ask you all to engage with me during my presentation.

So I see some phones up. You already know how it goes. You can get on your smart device. You don't need your laptops, you don't need all that stuff. You need your smartphone and the QR code or the link to this presentation's there. Once you get in, like it, love it. That way you all can engage with me and really feel this presentation that I'm about to present.

I first wanna stop and take a moment to thank Jason, my man, for showing so much love. Nicole, Tim, and the entire VEX Robotics team for having me here and for putting on this amazing event. Let's give them a hand please.

(Bernell clapping)
(audience applauding)

They're doing a hell of a job. This is my first ever world, anything. So I'm gonna give you a little quick story. Shout out to Josh 'cause he took the picture for me and you'll see the code still, they'll pop up in a little bit. Yesterday we got invited on the tour and if you were like me and if you get overly stimulated like me, I have two small children and oh, it was just yesterday, it was a little overwhelming to see all those kids happy, socializing, learning, competing, strategizing, all that stuff.

And I'm a former athlete, former basketball player. And so everything they were doing, it was times a million. And I felt that. And so I walked in, Jason was giving us a tour and I had to stop, I said, "Man, this is too much for me." And I saw the young man directly to my left. I didn't catch his name, but it didn't matter. And he was down there working on his robot and he looked up, he said, "What's up brother?" And I said, "Oh, I'm hooked." As soon as he said that.

(audience laughing)

And so I got down on knees and I just started talking to him and to see the type of love that he felt for what he was doing, the energy he was bringing to working on his robotic, how articulate he was, how engaged he was, how he was just, we were just talking about gameplay and I have no idea what he's talking about but I felt his energy, his two other teammates came and we just wrapped it up. We chopped it up for a good 10 minutes. And I reminded myself why I was here. Why I do what I do as an educator, to have moments like this with these students.

So these are my new buddies. I wanna give them a shout out from Tonopah, forgive me Arizona, the RoboColts. The RoboColts, if you see the RoboColts, my friends right here, show them some love. They got finals today, I wanna make sure that they win. I had to share that, so inspired by that.

So before I get into my session, I wanna say hello to you all and I'm just, I want to warn Jason and Nicole, I might need 30 minutes. I know but I'm a talker. So gimme five extra minutes. I just wanna put that disclaimer out there. But my session today is over accelerating local change for equitable CS education, equity in CS education.

Before we get into that, you need to know who I am. You need to get comfortable with me because as you can tell, I rely on you all and we gotta make sure our rapport is right. So my name is Bernell G. Murray.

I'm the Accelerator Program Lead at CSforALL, for this program I'm about to describe. This is again my 11th year in education. And I'm in Houston, Texas, from New Jersey, Jersey City. New Jersey folks? No, cool. But I live in Houston, Texas with my family. (Bernell chuckling)

I'm a professional, professional, student and community supporter. You are as well. Think about that. My favorite book, I don't know if you all read it, came out a couple years ago, is "Green Lights" by Matthew McConaughey. He had a live event about it that I attended. It's a great book, talks about keep living, even though we're educators, we still have our life outside of education, our jobs, we gotta keep living that way we have the energy to get in front of our young people, right? It's a great book, I strongly suggest you read it.

And my favorite quote, sorry for being so low, is "Learn continually." There's always one more thing to learn. We should never as educators stop learning. Not about the pedagogy, about the curriculum, about policy, about our kids, about our parents, about our community that we're serving. We should always be asking questions and figuring out how we can be better, agreed? Let's move on.

There is, I'm gonna give you some reminders about that. There is an opportunity for you all to ask questions at the bottom, make your comments. So show some love, don't just like and love, send some love via words as well. Let's keep it moving. So I'm a teacher, (Bernell chuckling) so we're gonna have some norms. We are gonna have some norms for this session. I'm not going to preach at y'all, it's not my profession, but I'm going to engage with you all. And I wanna learn from you all and figure out what it's like in your world. Very, very minute.

So our norms, contribute positively, positively, excuse me, to the session by using the chat and emoji features, sharing insight, use that chat feature to share your insight, your thoughts, your questions, and asking questions. And I'm gonna give you all an opportunity to check in with me after this 35-minute talk where you can continue asking those and we can have a conversation about this work.

Set aside time to reflect, all this learning that we're doing, shout out again to VEX. It's overwhelming, right? It's a lot, it's a lot to process. But if we don't set time and stop and think about what applies to me, what can I use, who do I need to connect with? It won't work, we can't use it. So I strongly encourage you all to set time to reflect on this particular program and see if it could work for you and your communities.

And most importantly, learn with interest. Have fun. And my grandmother used to tell me this all the time, show love. Show love to your neighbor, to your new friend, to your new educator partner, to me, to whomever, all these kids, which if we continue to show love, this world will be a better place, right? So let's do that. So as your time here for the rest of it, please do that. We're good on that. Let's keep it moving.

This is my favorite, one of my favorite quotes. "It is not beyond our power to create a world in which all children have access to a good education." We have that power to do that my friends as educators, right? You all have that power, each and every day students look at you and say, "Yes ma'am, no ma'am, yes sir, no sir." You are influencing them by your presence. So you have the power to change the trajectory of their learning experience. And I strongly encourage you all to own that.

But also we had a great conversation with my fellows down here, about this yesterday, be human. Students are human. We are human. So when they have moments, we've all had moments. When they need time, they need a break, honor that. Honor that, it's okay to let kids be human. 'Cause it builds trust, it builds understanding, it builds that love that I strongly encourage you all to do.

So we got an icebreaker, and I want you to think about your community as you respond to this. Look at your phone to submit your responses. What local supports need to be in place to create an ideal CS learning experience for all students? What supports do you think, in your own community, need to be in place? There's no wrong answer, but you'll see them populate. What do you think? Funding, buy-in. Love it. Let's keep 'em coming. Principal, teacher buy-in, access, equity, wow. Money.

(Bernell chuckling)

Framework. Inclusive. Training. Yes, yes. And yes. All are right, all are true. Money.

(Bernell chuckling)

That's the one that stands out, right? Correct. I love it, I love it. Parental support. We were talking about that yesterday. Purpose, oh I love that. Partnerships. Can someone get a picture of that screenshot, someone from VEX team, I need that. I gotta send that back to my family at CSforALL, that is a beautiful graphic. Love it, love it, love it, love it. All's true. But think about what you can manage and control in your position. It's difficult to bring all that, right? To execute on all that, but it's needed. We acknowledge that.

And so that's where I come in as an Accelerator Program Lead and for the work I do. So I'm gonna pause there and if someone possibly, I don't know who's looking at, hey Jason, I see you back there. Can you get a picture of this brother? My man, before I switch slides? I need that. Let's keep it moving.

So we're gonna get into the accelerated program and what that actually looks like. Again, accelerating local change for equitable CS education, equity. Equity, equity and CS education. I'll let you all read this mission from CSforALL, "An integral part of the educational experience for all K-12 students, educators, and support to students pathway," excuse me, "to college and career."

And I'm glad a lot of the educators out there have shifted that because we all know that a lot of our students aren't going to college. They might even focus on the military. And we need to make sure we set them up for whatever their interest, whatever their passions, take them. And that's what we're committed to at CSforALL.

About the accelerator program. Its mission is it aims to advance and empower high needs communities to progress towards K-12 computer science education and standards complete pathways, advance and empower. You'll see a lot of bolded and highlights 'cause I want them to stick with you. We do this with three goals. Increasing awareness around computer science education locally, increasing awareness. If people know about it, they're gonna be interested in it, right? They're gonna share more about it. They're gonna be partners with you about it.

Increasing educator capacity. And notice how it says educator, not teacher. We think about educators as teachers but I want you to think beyond that. My grandmother was my educator. My coach was my educator, right? My after school program coordinator was my educator. So making sure all educators that students are in front of have the capacity to serve them.

Increasing student participation in equitable ways, right? To interest-driven CS learning opportunities within their own community. Equitable. Hey, not, hey, come over here for this program. No, let me bring my program to you. Let me bring this initiative to you. Let me bring this community fair where you can learn about computer science and your families can get fed and you can get a dental cleaning to you and your community. That's what that means. So equity.

And we had a great conversation, I can't thank you Dr. Castillon, raise your hand? And Addie, man, we had a great conversation yesterday talking about equity. Equity within our communities. And the first thing we have to do is build trust. If you're going to your classroom every year and you're not building trust or getting to know your students and making sure they're comfortable in their seats, you're doing yourself a disservice.

You have to build trust with our kids nowadays. They have to know that you have their best interest and they feel loved by you. A lot of our kids, as we all know, don't have that at home, don't have that in the community, and are struggling or searching for it. That's why they act out, right? So we have to build trust to find equity. Listen and learn. Listen and learn.

In our communities, and I'm saying this because this is where I come from, Jersey City, Clinton Avenue was the toughest of the tough. Gun violence and all the things that you can imagine in a high-needs community happened. And I overcame that. What I was taught was to listen first. I don't have the answers. Students, you have the answers. You have the answers. I'll give you the foundation. You be creative and make robots, build programs. You have all the answers. So we listen to them and we learn from them. That way, we as educators can make the adjustment and we create opportunities.

I saw, I don't know how many, Jason, maybe 30,000 kids yesterday. That's why I was like, god damn, there's so many kids out here. It was amazing. I mean, they were grooving though. It was like I was in their way. I was doing this, hooping. We're creating opportunities for them to express themselves, for them to explore and jump on their interests. I did that with basketball. Basketball saved my life. You would not be seeing me right here on this stage if I didn't play basketball because that was my only outlet, my only way to make it, I thought. And so we need to create more opportunities for students, not just to explore robotics with all due respect, but whatever they're interested in. This is what this program is about. Obviously, we're focused on computer science and doing.

Addressing equity to meet goals. How that works within a community, how these goals are met within a community is this way: Each community, within each city, has a core community team, a team of decision-makers and stakeholders that represent that actual community. The school district, obviously where the students are, the university who we need to find more partnerships with within our school districts, and an out-of-school time provider or more. They meet regularly, discuss local challenges, what is happening in the community. They do some landscape analysis. What is needed, what are we're missing, what kids have access to, and so on and so forth. Set team goals and objectives. You'll see what I mean by that here shortly. Create projects and initiatives to engage not only with the students but also with other educators like yourself and the community at large, parents included. We have to support these communities in doing that.

So this is the icing on the cake for me in this program. This is what got me so invested in it because it's what is needed. You saw it in the middle of the screen, which was money. To assist these teams, we provide them $60,000 non-competitive. It's yours. To meet whatever goals and initiatives that they set out for as a unit. Now representing CSforALL and the 20 people that work for CSforALL, can you believe that 20 people work for my organization? We also provide these other benefits: membership into our organization where you could connect with all of our partners and organizations and other educators that are within our realm. Direct community support from me and the rest of my team. Support and capacity building and professional development. Invitations to our summit, which will be in Oakland. Every year, we go to a high-needs community and really showcase that community and what they have to offer in CS education. Fellowship and network opportunities with CSforALL and all of our partners, including Google, Amazon, and all the big ones. And so much more.

So obviously, we understand the value of money and what that can do to help a community.

We take that very seriously to support our communities. So we are currently in six wonderful cities across the country: Denver, Colorado; Detroit, Michigan; Duluth, Minnesota; Miami, Florida; Nashville, Tennessee; and Washington DC. This is our pilot year, our first year of the program. They are finishing their first year within the program next month. And so we're super honored for what they've done and all the great things that they are accomplishing while in this program.

I'm excited to announce that cohort two is launching in June in these six cities: Atlanta, Oakland, Phoenix, and Pittsburgh. Shout out to...

(audience cheering)

You already know it's going down. San Francisco and Springfield, Vermont. Now six and six and six and six and six, we're growing, that's my point. And there's an opportunity for you all to be a part of the next iterations of this program. So please, you'll see an opportunity for us to connect and kind of talk about why you need this within your own community. Where is New York?

(Bernell chuckling)

I love it. So I wanna show you all something, some views, some pictures of what that looks like and think about what I've expressed in the values that I've shared with you all that will really help us grow in the education space. And see if you can see that within some of these pictures I shared.

This is the Miami team, fellowshipping. They're not thinking about education and students, they're fellowshipping, they're loving on each other, they're figuring out things together. This was in Denver, Colorado School of Mines. We haven't been out there, it's a wonderful school. And they do a lot of great things in the CS space for students. And that is Christine Levy and Stephanie Beacham, and they're leading. One on my right leads the multilingual engineer program at Colorado School of Mines, which is a very affluent school, but she's focused on the equitable aspects at that university, so proud of her.

Couple more. This event, I'm so proud of this. You'll see a couple of students from this as well. This was a Spanish-speaking only event in Miami. From the presenters to the M.C., everything was Spanish-speaking. Imagine, I see a few Miami folks there, imagine the impact that that had on that community. We're gonna serve you in your native language. We're gonna respect where your background is and we're gonna make sure we honor you there. It was a beautiful event.

Couple more. This is me raising awareness about this program again in Chicago last year at CSTA. Super excited about that. Couple more. This was the panelists and the leaders of that Miami event I just described. A couple more, couple more students. I had another one and I should have put this picture up, it was a mom and her son doing programming together. It was beautiful, oh it was amazing. And they've been doing this in Miami the entire year.

This, and I have to tell this little anecdote about this community, this is Detroit and the young lady, Ms. Kennedy, right here. She is the only one leading her CS department in Detroit, think about how big Detroit is. She's the only one in that department. She's one of one. Imagine that. A hundred thousand kids and you're the only one leading a CS initiative. So I hope that, I don't want to say that joke, but she's feeling it, right? She's feeling it. And everyone surrounding her represents Michigan State University, Mercy College, Microsoft TEALS, Detroit Mercer. I mean so many credible organizations partner with her to help her in the work, that's community. That's community. And that's what we hope to see within this program. So proud of what that team, Kapor Center. They do a lot of great things in this space.

Couple more, then we'll move on. This was in Duluth, Minnesota. Teachers, educators, engaging with students in relation to CS education, love it. Students engaged. You already know what this is like. I'm just so proud of what they did.

This is us, the Denver team. The Denver team. Super proud of them and the work that they do. This was at our CSforALL summit. I just wanted some likes and loves for these pictures, that's all. (Bernell chuckling)

And this is our CSforALL team. Again, there's not that many of us, but I'm sure you all heard of CSforAll. I'm so proud and so honored to work with them each and every day because they make it all happen.

So the impact. Couple quotes I'll have you all read. As a result of their involvement in this program. Building capacity. That's what I want you all to think about before you leave. This program allows you to build capacity. Garner new relationships. Gain new partners.

So I have some videos, but I want you all to learn more. So here is my QR code, so you can exit outta that app, take a picture, and it has everything about me. Well, not too much, but everything how we could connect as far as my Twitter, my LinkedIn, my program site, some views of videos about the program. And feel free to set a Calendly link and set up a call where you and I can chat and chop it up and talk about this program and see how we can make it to where you are.

And I see some cameras up, so I'll pause and give about 10 seconds for y'all to be nosy and then go in there and get what you need. But yes, bookmark this code and reach out to me and let's get started, let's get started. It will pop up again at the end of my presentation.

How y'all feeling about this so far? Talk to me, show me some love. What's going on? (audience applauding)

I love it. I love it, wake up, wake up with me. All right. I wanna show you all some accelerator views as I like to call them. I'm a big Drake fan, he had a great album called "Views" and so I stole that from him. I'm already getting, I'm getting a bunch of links on my Apple Watch, but all these people connected. And I want you to show you kind of what an experience was, accelerator experience was in Miami and this was the hackathon during CS Ed Week this past December. And without further ado, watch this.

(upbeat music)

Hi, I am Willy and I am the President of the Computer Science Teacher Association, the Miami chapter. Our mission is to build a community of computer science teachers and to improve computer science education in Miami. Today we're here to celebrate Computer Science Education Week and we have multiple opportunities for high school and for middle school students through a hackathon. And we also are offering multiple workshops for teachers of all levels, all subjects and the idea is to keep expanding computer science so we can give that opportunity to as many students as possible.

(upbeat music continues)

One of my favorite things I learned today was, definitely about the last thing I did was the VEX education. I would love to implement it at my school, but I do like the idea of the kids doing their own web design. I thought that was very good.

(upbeat music continues)

Hi, my name is Kimberly. I am a sophomore at iTech. Today we're working on this new vehicle with the Infento Pro Kit and we're almost done. I'm thankful to my teacher, Dr. Cash, to have this opportunity. Max and Carlos and my teammate, Lenny, Victor, Ramald and Alex.

(upbeat music continues)

As we close out another Computer Science Education Week here in South Florida, CST Miami is here to support teachers and students in developing critical computer science skills for jobs of today. Today we brought together students and teachers and community folks, all passionate about closing the gap in computer science education. We look forward to doing this again next year, join us.

(upbeat music continues)

So that team is made up of Miami EdTech, Code/Art, Microsoft TEALS, and the Miami chapter.

And they worked together, Max Ringelheim, Riders Robotics League, and they worked together within the accelerated program as the core community team, working with Miami-Dade public schools and the surrounding community to fulfill the program goals. They put on this wonderful, amazing event and also hosted that Spanish-speaking-only event. Imagine the work that they're doing, the awareness that they're creating, the energy that they're creating around CS education in that community. So proud of them, so proud of them.

So let's have a discussion. On your phone, you can go back. How do students and educators benefit from having community-led CS Ed initiatives, like the one you just saw? How do students and you all as educators benefit from that? Not feeling alone, wow. Community, absolutely. Tap into the community. Yes, absolutely. Our parents and our community members know their community. Know what our community needs. Collaboration, I love it. Gimme some other things. Come on, talk to me. How do students and educators benefit from this? They have support, representation. You know, the principals feel good when they see their community involved, right? You know the district and district leaders feel good when they see everyone in the community invested in an initiative. They're more willing to support initiatives like that, right? Commitment, local solutions, empowered, absolutely. Beautiful. Beautiful. More buy-in, that's the word I was looking for. Buy-in, absolutely. I love it, all correct. Access, stay here for about 10 more seconds. Networking, yes absolutely, absolutely.

Another video about the impact of this program. And this is Jen Rosato from Duluth, Minnesota. Watch this.

Hi, my name's Jen Rosato and I'm Director of the National Center for Computer Science Education in parts of the Duluth community core team in the accelerator project. And just wanted to share how glad we are that we are a part of the project. It has really been the catalyst that we needed to pull together community partners, including the school district, as well as some of the out-of-school time providers and community organizations that reach students when they're not in school. And I think the accelerator project has been really helpful in us thinking about the full system of supports that students use in our community and in even just thinking about what makes our community Duluth unique and how we wanna support computer science education.

So honored to work with Jen. So in the spirit of competition, we got a game. I'm a competitor at heart. I compete with my kids every day, I just let them win but I compete with them every day. So if you're not in, join the game and we're gonna see how much you retain. That's why I engage with you because I was hoping you retain and when you retain, you share, get it? So let's play a game. Y'all ready? I see some competitive faces, I got, one lady got serious on me, I love it. Winner of this game. I got something for you, so see me after my session. Jason, gimme about five, 10 more minutes, brother. That's game time, game time. What's up, talk to me y'all ready? It's game time, let's do it.

(Bernell laughing)

All right. Fastest answers. Whoa, wow, wow, wow, that's cool. Y'all ready? Let's do it. Answer faster you get more points my friends. How many communities from across the country are currently participating in this program? Keep your answers to yourself, my friends. What are we doing? Ah.

(Bernell laughing)

You vote on your phone. Ooh, we rocking, we rocking, we rocking. I love it, we rocking. Next question. See if y'all are paying attention. Which three key stakeholders make up the core community team? There's three stakeholders. Which ones? I'm getting a little nervous about this question. It's a tough one.

(Bernell humming)

The school district, university, and the out-of-school time provider. But how about this? Trick question or add-on, can all these stakeholders be a part of it?

Thank you all for your participation and enthusiasm. Your energy and commitment to community-led initiatives are truly inspiring. Keep up the great work, and let's continue to support and empower our communities through education.

Yes, correct. Correct, but these are the decision makers. Look at the leader boy, Skidz. Skidz, you rocking, I see you. Bron the Broken (Bernell laughing).

Clippy, all right, let's go. Let's keep it rocking, let's keep it rocking. All right, next question. Answer faster to get more points. Speed test, select CSforALL accelerator, speed test. See how fast your fingers are, y'all text all day. They gotta be fast. Ooh, ooh. Let's keep it moving. All right, answer fast. Got two more, rock with me. Which Rocky Mountain community works alongside Detroit, Duluth, Miami, Nashville, Washington D.C.? In this program, which Rocky Mountain Community, my friends? There we go, Denver is correct. Denver is correct.

Last one, we're gonna do a leaderboard check. That's where it goes down fourth quarter. Which selection is not an accelerator program goal, is not a program goal. Yes. We're not in the business of making IDT developers, if they wanna do that, yeah, obviously by all means. But our goal is to increase those opportunities for them to find that if they want to become that. Absolutely. Let's figure out who the winner is. Who was it? Is that Angelica? Talk to me. What we got Skidz! Who's Skidz? Stand up please. Skidz stand up man. So everybody can give Skidz a hand.

(Bernell clapping)
(audience applauding)

Congratulations Skidz. See me after, Skidz, thank you for paying attention brother. I appreciate that. (Bernell chuckling) See me after this man and we'll talk, absolutely.

So this is our Executive Director and I'm getting ready to close, but I wanted you to hear from her directly in support of this. This is Leigh Ann.

Hi VEX World. My name is Leigh Ann DeLyser and I am the Executive Director at Computer Science for All. I am so glad that Murray is there with you to share our work to help advance computer science education in the United States. I was a high school teacher, teaching math and computer science for 10 years. During that time, I had my own robotics club that I advised, and there was nothing better than the light in students' eyes when they solved a problem or made their robot go. I remember one student jumping around my computer lab doing an "it works" dance as one of the highlights of the joy that happens through robotics and computer science education. I hope you're all there celebrating the amazing work that our kids do, the creativeness that robotics brings into the classroom every day, and the way in which computer science and other disciplines like science or math can be combined to inspire and engage. Thank you for all that you do and I hope you have a great event, thank you, bye.

Thank you Leigh Ann. Absolutely.

(audience applauding)

She's such a supporter of this movement and of me and how I've moved. I'm so honored to work under her, through her leadership.

So some takeaways. Some takeaways that I want you all to leave with. We aim to advance and empower high needs communities. To increase awareness, educator capacity and professional development, and students' opportunities for them to learn and explore on their own. Core community teams drive the work. I do not make the decisions for these communities. I do not make decisions for Miami. I'm the bridge for them. I do not make decisions for Duluth and so on and so forth. I'm the bridge for them. The community members make those decisions and we assist by giving $60,000 non-competitively. It's theirs. We want you all to do the work. Don't worry about how much it costs. Our next cohort launches June of this year, which I'm super excited about, super anxious about, and can't wait to continue this work.

So again, based on this learning session, exit ticket. Before you take off, in the next couple days or so, what inspired you about this program? What resonated with you? Please share. Equity, access, collaboration. Help is there, absolutely. Community driven, hope. Hope, hope. Love that. Cohort base, yes. Doable, absolutely. Supportive. All.

I mean, this is beautiful. This is beautiful. Support, I love it. Understanding, absolutely. Being a former educator, I understand exactly what you all are experiencing in and out of your communities.

Last one, vision, diversity yes. Everyone, yes. Keep going. Jason, you got this brother, my man.

So again, if you all want to learn about this program, how to connect with me, how to get involved, how to advocate for your community getting this opportunity, please contact me and I'll do my damnedest to make sure it happens.

Again, I thank Jason, Tim, Nicole, and the rest of the VEX Robotics team for this opportunity and I look forward to connecting with you all soon.

Appreciate it, peace.

(audience applauding)

(upbeat music)